The reviews are in on Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice and they don't look good for a studio hoping to start a billion-dollar superhero franchise.

The comic book action film starring Ben Affleck as the caped crusader and Henry Cavill as the man of steel premiers nationwide on Friday, but critics are by and large telling their readers to save their money.

Among one of the more hilarious lines was J.R. Jones at the Chicago Reader, who said the film 'was 'not as bad as Bush v. Gore, but close'.

As the reviews came in,Variety revealed that Warner Bros will need to make at least $800million from the film just to break even.

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Not quite two thumbs up: Ben Affleck, Gal Gadot and Henry Cavill star in Batman v Superman: Dawn Of Justice opening this weekend. But critics have slammed the film for being humorless, disjointed and gloomy

And there's even more pressure on the film to go above and beyond that expectation since this is the first of 10 DC Entertainment films the studio plans to release over the next five years and the launch of this film could set the tone on whether this new venture will be a success, as the company has promised its Wall Street investors.

Spawning a franchise: The film is the first of a series of DC Comics movies from Warner Bros.

'They have the chance to come out with all these other movies,' media analyst Jessica Reif Cohen of Bank of America/Merrill Lynch told Variety. 'But it makes the situation much harder; harder to win an audience, harder to market, if this one doesn't work. … It's pretty critical.'

However, there is good news for the studio in the fact that pre-sales for the film are the biggest in history, topping previous record-holders The Dark Knight Rises and Avengers: Age of Ultron.

The Batman v Superman showdown sets the scene for a slate of DC Comics films from Warner Bros. and stars Henry Cavill reprising his Superman role from Man Of Steel, and Ben Affleck as a new incarnation of the Caped Crusader.

Affleck's casting was greeted with groans by ardent comic book fans, but critics generally applaud his efforts to make Bruce Wayne a darker and more weary type of hero.

But almost universally reviews lay the blame for the film's failure to deliver on director Zack Snyder, who helmed Man Of Steel and Watchman.

'This movie is a crime against comic book fans,' screams the headline for Vox.com's review.

'This was supposed to be the most epic superhero movie ever made. Instead, we got a cliched, manic villain and two well-intentioned heroes fighting for no reason at all,' wrote The Daily Beast's reviewer.

WHAT CRITICS HAD TO SAY ABOUT BATMAN V SUPERMAN: DAWN OF JUSTICE

A.V. CLUB: 'Directed by Zack Snyder, of faithfully butchered Watchmen fame, Batman V Superman takes a title fight kids of all ages have been speculating about for decades - costumed titan from the cosmos, meet costumed vigilante from the city - and invests it with all the fun of a protracted custody battle.'

BOSTON GLOBE: 'Gotham City is actually Jersey City. Or maybe it's Hoboken. Whatever, it's right across the river from Metropolis/Manhattan, which makes sense in this movie, because Cavill's Superman is one of those graceful 1-percenters with no body fat and hand-tailored outfits that not even a nuclear warhead can wrinkle. He doesn't sweat, whereas you just know Affleck's Batman has a bad case of bridge-and-tunnel B.O.'

CHICAGO SUN-TIMES: 'When it sings, 'Dawn of Justice' is a wonder. When it drags, it still looks good and offers hints of a better scene just around the corner.'

CHICAGO READER: 'Not as bad as Bush v. Gore, but close.'

THE DAILY BEAST: 'This was supposed to be the most epic superhero movie ever made. Instead, we got a cliched, manic villain and two well-intentioned heroes fighting for no reason at all.'

DEADSPIN: 'Oof, Lex Luthor is a drag. Jesse Eisenberg preens and over-enunciates and waxes crazily pedantic, like no one told him he's not in a Sorkin movie anymore; his method of conveying Brilliant Insanity is to make as though he just ingested touring funk band quantities of cocaine.'

EMPIRE: 'There are moments that make the whole enterprise worthwhile, and introduces an intriguing new Batman. But it's also cluttered and narratively wonky; a few jokes wouldn't have gone amiss, either.'

ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY: 'It’s another numbing smash-and-bash orgy of CGI mayhem with an ending that leaves the door open wide enough to justify the next 10 installments. Is it too late to demand a rematch?'

GQ MAGAZINE: 'This is a film so bad it wears you down and makes you wonder if there was ever such a thing as a hero anyway.'

MIAMI HERALD: 'In Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, the Dark Knight and the Man of Steel duke it out and the audience loses.'

THE NEW REPUBLIC: 'Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice is a joyless slog. Filled with scenes of gloomy characters confronting their demons or wrestling with their insipid moral quandaries, it’s not a superhero movie so much as it is an excruciating therapy session in which there are occasionally huge explosions and guys in capes.'

NEW YORK POST: 'Constantly threatening to collapse from self-seriousness, this epic has way too much of everything, including CGI and Oscar winners up the wazoo.'

NEW YORK TIMES: 'The studio has, in the usual way, begged and bullied critics not to reveal plot points, and I wouldn't dream of denying you the thrill of discovering just how overstuffed and preposterous a movie narrative can be.'

TIME: 'Batman v Superman lunges for greatness instead of building toward it: It’s so top-heavy with false portent that it buckles under its own weight.'

TIME OUT NEW YORK: 'If there's any justice, dawning or otherwise, at the multiplex, audiences will reject Zack Snyder's lumbering, dead-on-arrival superhero mélange, a $250 million tombstone for a genre in dire need of a break.'

VULTURE: 'With Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice, the movie division of DC Entertainment and the parent studio, Warner Bros., have given the fanboys and the Nolanoids what they crave—and lo, it is impressive and, lo, it is godawful.'

USA TODAY: '[Batman v Superman] will please those either waiting for the two main players to lock horns on a movie screen, or those who've just been pining for Wonder Woman forever.'

THE WRAP: 'That face-off between two comics legends becomes but one in a series of big things bashing into other big things, which is what Snyder and writers Chris Terrio and David S. Goyer mistake for storytelling.'

However. the movie did win some critics over, with Richard Roeper of the Chicago Sun-Times giving it three stars.

'When it sings, 'Dawn of Justice' is a wonder. When it drags, it still looks good and offers hints of a better scene just around the corner,' Roeper wrote.

'There are moments that make the whole enterprise worthwhile, and introduces an intriguing new Batman. But it's also cluttered and narratively wonky; a few jokes wouldn't have gone amiss, either. opined Britain's Empire magazine.

Rolling Stone's Peter Travers also gave Batman v Superman three stars, saying: 'Better than Man of Steel but below the high bar set by Nolan's Dark Knight, Dawn of Justice is still a colossus, the stuff that DC Comics dreams are made of for that kid in all of us who yearns to see Batman and Superman suit up and go in for the kill.'

Praise: Affleck generally won over critics who praised him for his acting chops and for bringing to life a 'more gritty and world weary' Batman, while Cavill was less lauded for his second outing as Superman

There are plaudits, too, for Affleck in his first outing as Bruce Wayne.

'This iteration of Batman may be one of the best yet. I would happily see a Ben Affleck stand-alone Batman movie, and most of the audience would agree,' said ComingSoon.net.